The HTC U Play is our type on paper … How we made the handset the semi-official mobile handset of Love Island

For those of you that didn’t know, alongside our “traditional” media work, we also look after product placement and influencer seeding for our good friends at HTC.

When asked us to focus on lifestyle placement for their mid-range HTC U Play handset, we decided there was no other option than to get in contact with the producers over at ITV and make it the official mobile handset for this year’s Love Island.

For FREE!

Just in case you haven’t been glued to the ITV2 reality show every night for the past seven weeks, the phones are only of the only items of technology the islanders are allowed to access, acting as a distraction from coupling up, “putting it on” each other, and generally gossiping about who said what.

All summer, the HTC U Play handsets have been used to communicate the latest twists and surprise re-couplings from Caroline Flack and the show’s producers, in addition to an “island chat”, where contestants can message one another about the latest juicy happenings.

So why did team HTC think the U Play would be the ideal mobile for Love Island? For one thing, it’s got a “Pocket Mode” feature, meaning it blasts out extra-loud notifications when the phone detects it’s in your pocket — perfect for noisily announcing that you’ve GOT A TEXT and gathering friends to read it aloud. It’s also got a 16MP “Ultra-Selfie” front-facing camera – a very important feature for those all-important villa selfies around the firepit and hideaway!

But the team didn’t just settle on getting the handsets seen by roughly 2.2 million viewers EVERY night, every few minutes. After a ring around to our showbiz and feature contacts, we secured coverage dedicated to the handset’s role in the reality show in the Evening Standard (print), Evening Standard Online, Mirror Online, OK! Online and Heat Online.

The HTC U Play is 100% our type on paper. We’re glad to see the media thought so too.